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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25682320">When life infects you with a truth telling drug, make your friend discuss feelings (and then blame it all on the dope)</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/AssyEr/pseuds/AssyEr'>AssyEr</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Mechanisms (Band)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Truth Drug, and thats a hill ill die on, but listen, but what if... it didnt happen and was for the better?, canon atypical discussion of feelings, does this need more editing? perphaps but its almost midnight, i ship marius and lyf, im just saying, like just to acclimate the scenary, marius is a bad person with fucked up feelings towards life and all that, marius is forced to say the truth and will make that raphs problem, no beta we die like man, some descriptions of corpses, this is going to get kind of spoilery</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 06:00:11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>4,099</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25682320</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/AssyEr/pseuds/AssyEr</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>"(...) the only thing they received from the crews before they disappeared were descriptions of the people that had been there before them, dead on the floor. They had apparently murder each other with a violence beyond humane possible, on their words. Then, screams of rage and silence.<br/> “Sounds like fun,” said Marius upon getting the brief of his mission, go up there and find whatever got them all crazy."</p>
<p> </p>
<p>There is a ship that had been orbiting the planet for centuries, left in quarantine because some mysterious sickness that makes everyone that steeps inside murder each other with utmost violence.<br/> Raph sends Marius to see what that is it all about.<br/> Feelings are discussed.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Raphaella la Cognizi &amp; Marius von Raum</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>56</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Writer's Month 2020</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>When life infects you with a truth telling drug, make your friend discuss feelings (and then blame it all on the dope)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>For the writter's month challange, August 2nd, the prompt being "quarentine"... it got out of hand.</p>
<p>cw for descriptions of corpses, Marius being very disrespectfull towards the dead, and some gore</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Marius von Raum was now regretting every single choice that led him here.</p>
<p>Or rather, one choice. One very, very specifically choice, which was saying yes to Raphaella when she asked him if he could help her with some new experiment of her.</p>
<p>The Aurora had stopped in some old planet that served as some sort of distribution center for that corner of the galaxy. It had been kind of an unofficial stop, in the sense that everyone but the first mate had been aware that they were doing it. The reason why it remained a secret was because everyone knew that Jonny would throw a tantrum if he were to know about it, because the place had one of the lowest levels of violence in the universe, as the only people that inhabited it were the employers of the different shipping companies (practically slaves, if you asked Nastya) and basically had no energy to spend in senseless fighting.</p>
<p>Now, normally, none of the crew, except perhaps Ivy and sometimes Brian, would be attracted to such premise, so it had been Nastya’s job to convince the rest of what a good opportunity it was, because she was the one who wanted to come in the first place. She spoke to them about books from every single corner of the universe, of the incredible weaponry that was swept under the carpet; of the gangs that were formed under the most dubious laws, and of a ship that had been quarantined on its orbit for centuries.</p>
<p>And so the Aurora landed there, and the mechanisms were freed.</p>
<p>When he revived after a clean shot in the head, and gotten out of the commotion of being suddenly planet side and in the middle of some random street, Jonny d’Ville found a bar on the first day, and managed to kill everyone on the place and around. The last thing Marius heard from him was that he was enjoying his life of a fugitive murder, and couldn’t wait to see where the rest of the mechs were, to pay them a friendly visit.</p>
<p>Both Nastya and Tim had gotten more interested on the port side of the planet, where millions of pounds of cargo awaited for them to steal it. Tim found himself making a huge expansion on his weaponry collection, and even admitted to Nastya that the planet was indeed worth the fuel wasted to get there.</p>
<p>Ivy… actually, Marius had no idea of what Ivy had been up to. He supposed that much like Tim and Nastya, she had focused on the imported products the place had to offer, or some library there must surely be somewhere. There was the possibility of her being with Brian, as the pilot had seemed to also disappear from the radar.</p>
<p>Ashes had tagged along with Jonny for a while, until they got tired of the senseless violence and looked forwards to some useful violence. Apparently new gangs fights had taken place since they made the decision. Marius stood far away from those.</p>
<p>The Toy Soldier did whatever the Toy Soldier usually did when they arrived into a new planet.</p>
<p>Marius had fun the first decade. A port planet, after all, tended to have multitudes of people from different backgrounds, all around the cosmos, which was like a buffet for someone who really wanted to psychoanalyze new people. But after a few years it got more and more dull, and he blamed that boredom for the worst mistake he had made on that century.</p>
<p>He went to see what Raph was up to.</p>
<p>She had gotten herself a lab, and a couple of subjects to experiment on. Whether those subjects were voluntaries, or the lab legitimacy hers, he did not ask. It was hers enough that no one tried to invade the place more than once a week, tough, and that was ownership enough for her.</p>
<p>Raphaella had been trilled to find that Marius had gotten bored, and asked him if he wanted to help her in some minor, harmless experiment, and he, like a complete idiot, had said yes.</p>
<p>A couple of centuries ago, she told him, there was a ship who had been ordered to transport some chemical cargo from Malone to here, to then redistribute it along the galaxy. However, when it got near the orbit, it turned out that there was no one inside alive to answer the customs house’s questions.</p>
<p>Naturally, a small vessel had been sent to board the transport and try to find out what happened. Then, when that team didn’t come back, another one, and another one, until there was no one left willing to board the starship. The only thing they received from the crews before they disappeared were descriptions of the people that had been there before them, dead on the floor. They had apparently murder each other with a violence beyond humane possible, on their words. Then, screams of rage and silence.</p>
<p>“Sounds like fun,” said Marius upon getting the brief of his mission, go up there and find whatever got them all crazy.</p>
<p>This was not fun, he told himself, walking on the corridors of the mysterious ship.</p>
<p>The people who had written the report had not been joking. Marius found it hard to tell when a body ended, and another one started. There were blood and bits of bones scattered everywhere, sloshing and cracking under his steeps, so much that he found it hard to keep walking. Whatever had gotten to them, it had made the people turn one against the other with whatever thing they had on hand, let it be some wrench or their own nails. Marius saw a corpse with marks of teeth on all of its visible flesh.</p>
<p>“Marius, can you hear me?” Raphaella asked from the comm.</p>
<p>He picked the small radio, and took his helmet off to speak freely. “Yes, I just entered. This place looks like someone freed a starved Jonny with a pipe” he told her.</p>
<p>But it was not true. A starved Jonny would at least eat the meat, keeping the place relatively tidier. This was a complete mess.</p>
<p>Marius walked over some putrid chest, making sure not to step on the spilled guts. “Good, it’s good that we can still hear you. Most communications started to fail when getting near to the ship’s orbit” she told him.</p>
<p>He kept moving on to the center of the ship, passing near a door that said “the truth will free you, John 8:31-32”. He thought better not to look too closely the dark red letters.</p>
<p>“That’s some very interesting piece of information that I would have liked to have known before you launched me here” the fake baron said.</p>
<p>Raph just laughed, and started to info dump him with facts of the other missions, like how fast the screaming started, or how many deaths have been actually recorded. He decided to turn the radio off for now.</p>
<p>He advanced to the most crowded places of the ship, and eventually getting to the kitchen. Luckily for him, it seemed that not many had thought of food on their final moments (yet another proof of their madness), and so the amount of bodies there was relatively small, just three or six. But most of them had pretty common deaths, like getting shot or hit on the head, which meant that the place was in much better condition that the corridors, cleaner. Or clean enough to make Marius realize how hungry he actually was.</p>
<p>Inspecting the backroom, he found some crates that contained food not so spoiled. There were cans of Space Tuna, and Space Peas, and even some Space Frozen Chicken. And because he could do with a snack, he started to search for some microwave or oven he could cook the food with.</p>
<p>While he waited for the chicken to finish getting nice and cooked, he kept looking around for what he could find. There was some bread, but a guy had died on top of it, and had bleed all over and completely ruined it. He also discovered some crackers, that were under the blood and intestines of another dude, yes, but they had been wrapped in a plastic package, so it was fine.</p>
<p>He filled all of his pockets with them, and opened one to eat while looking for a plate. Finding a not perfect but acceptable considering the circumstances replacement for a dish, he served the chicken and peas. He moved a corpse that was on the counter out of the way, throwing it to the floor, and sat on top of the furniture to eat his food.</p>
<p>The definitely-not-a-doctor considered turning on the radio, but decided against it. He didn’t want to hear Raph’s gross facts while he ate; he preferred to hear them while he walked the so called hell-ship, like a guided tour.</p>
<p>The chicken was kind of unsavory, and the peas were no better, but the tuna was exquisite, if a little bit tainted. The crackers were… crackers. He dumped the remains on the floor, and returned to his travesty.</p>
<p>Marius turned the radio back on. “Raph?” he asked.</p>
<p>Her voice was quick to respond. “You turn your radio off again, and I’m leaving you there for a millennium,” she threatened. “I need to get reliable data”</p>
<p>“Yeah, yeah,” mumbled Marius. “Because that’s all you care about, right?” he said in a resented tone.</p>
<p>Okay. What the hell. Where the fuck had that come from.</p>
<p>Like, it was true, but still. Why had he said that? He always made sure to repress his feelings.</p>
<p>Raph had no idea what to say to that. “I mean, yes? We all know that?” she tried.</p>
<p>Again, words escaped Marius before he had a said on the matter. “It would have been hard not to notice by now.”</p>
<p>He stopped walking. There was something wrong with him. He told her so without thinking (but then when did he think about anything he said).</p>
<p>“Marius?” he could practically hear her grinning.</p>
<p>“I can practically hear you grinning” he told her.</p>
<p>“I think that the thing in the ship is finally affecting you!” she said with emotion.</p>
<p>Marius kicked some random head out of the way, and sat on the floor. This seemed like a Serious Time. “And what, please do tell me, is this thing you believe?” he asked her.</p>
<p>He wanted a nice, straight answer. Please, let him have a clear straight answer.</p>
<p>“I have no fucking clue!” Raph told him, and he groaned audibly, hitting his head against the wall behind him. Of course she didn’t have. “However!” she said upon hearing his wailing. “However, I am definitely going to find out”</p>
<p>“How?” he asked her, genuinely curious. She was thousands of kilometers away from the ship.</p>
<p>There was a moment of silence, as she seemed to think of an answer. In the meantime, Marius opened a cracker and started stress eating.</p>
<p>He wished he could eat his problems away.</p>
<p>“I know” her voice sounded unexpectedly from the radio. “I think I have some theory, based on what just happened a moment before.” She made a pause for dramatic effect. Marius was about to yell at her when she continued. “The theories per se aren’t exactly important-”</p>
<p>“I beg to differ,” interrupted Marius.</p>
<p>She paid no mind to him. “But I am going to make a series of statements, and you tell me how they make you feel.”</p>
<p>Marius was ready to share a feeling. “That makes me worry,” he told her.</p>
<p>She hummed in affirmation, and he heard the sound of pen in paper, before she continued.</p>
<p>“Okay, fist statement. Nastya is a better violinist that you are or could ever hope to be,” she told him in a neutral tone, as if she hadn’t just used his self-esteem like a punch bag with that sentence. “How does that make you feel?”</p>
<p>Marius stood up, radio in hand, and started pacing around. Oh, where to start?</p>
<p>“Well, very fucking angry, because that’s a rude thing to say,” he paused for a moment as he got his feet out of someone’s rib cage, and cleaned the shoe on the wall. “But anger is a secondary emotion, you know? I read it somewhere. I think. The point is, I am angry because you fucking hurt me. Even if it was just to make an experiment on me, it hurt my feelings.” He jumped over some arm that was on the floor, walking now in circles. “You know how insecure I feel about my place in the crew, and you telling me that, especially because you and Ivy are the people I feel the closest to, well, it sucks. So I change my answer to hurt”</p>
<p>Marius almost falls on the floor at steeping at something red and viscous, as the weight of what he said fell upon him.</p>
<p>Raphaella was silent on the other side.</p>
<p>“Now I feel uncomfortable,” he added, being very useful.</p>
<p>Still nothing from the other side. Marius grabbed another cracker and shoved it into his mouth.</p>
<p>Then, she spoke. “Marius?” she tenably asked, and he could tell he was not the only one that wanted to forget what he had just said.</p>
<p>Did he have to answer? Couldn’t he just turn off the comm, and resign himself to his new fate on the hell-spaceship? But the crackers would eventually run out, he supposed, and he wasn’t as keen as Jonny on eating discomposed bodies. “Yes?”</p>
<p>“What is your name?” Where did that come from?</p>
<p>“Marius von Raum. What-“ Raph cut him mid-sentence.</p>
<p>“The name you were given at birth?”</p>
<p>“Byron von Raum” Marius said, and then covered his mouth with his hands.</p>
<p>He hadn’t said that name in a long, long time. He had hoped to never say it again, having left it in some old, decaying planet so many millennia ago. Raph had no right to stole it like that from him.</p>
<p>“Why did you ask that?” he whispered into the comm. “You had no right.”</p>
<p>He had changed it for a reason.</p>
<p>La Cognizi ignored him. “Okay, I think you are under some sort of truth drug-“</p>
<p>Was she just going to ignore what she did? Again?</p>
<p>“Shut up!” he screamed to her. “Just, shut the fuck up with your data and theories and- Augh!” He kicked some poor guy’s head, watching it roll through the corridor.</p>
<p>He was angry. He was getting very, very angry with her. “It’s all the same with you! You just- you never listen! Always!” He couldn’t believe he had held for so long, because it was fucking true, she <em>always</em> did that.</p>
<p>“I tell you that this thing you said hurt me, and you just carry on with your stupid experiments” he is now just kicking at everything on the floor near him, doing what her mother’s would call a tantrum, and <em>he couldn’t care less. </em>“As then! You just ask me my fucking name? What the fuck is wrong with you? And it’s the same with Ivy! On Midgard-“</p>
<p>She interrupted him again. “Is this about Lyf?” if she was containing herself, he could not tell.</p>
<p>He saw the head he had pushed aside before to sit on the floor. It looked at him with that fucking expression, as if it was making fun of him, of his tantrum, of how much he was still being ignored, treated like a child.</p>
<p>He threw it against the wall</p>
<p>“Well, now it is!” He stepped on a random ribcage lying around, getting his foot stuck. “I’m still angry about it!” he couldn’t get it out of that stupid piece of shit. “I told you I wanted to grab them! We could have! And you just-!” his other feet stepped on spilled guts, and having no support, Marius fell to the floor.</p>
<p>He just laid there, looking at the ceiling. Things were getting blurry, in and out of focus. The corridor seemed to get darker. Distantly, he heard Raphaella’s voice calling him from the comm. At least it wasn’t broken, wherever it was. He almost wished it was.</p>
<p>Everything was black, and Marius died.</p>
<p>When he returned to the land of the living, the first thing he noticed was a low singing coming from his right. Raph’s voice. She was singing some song he couldn’t quite catch, but at least it allowed him to find the comm in between all the red it had fallen into. It seemed that at least the gore had soften its fall, even if it made the task of finding it a fucking disgusting one.</p>
<p>“I’m here, I came back” he told her once he grabbed the gadget.</p>
<p>He felt exhausted, and most of the rage he had felt before was now a distant memory.</p>
<p>She was quick to answer. “What happened? Did someone…?”</p>
<p>He was the one to cut her this time. “No, no, just got angry, kicked a couple of corpses, died in the middle” he was not telling her he fell to the floor and opened his head.</p>
<p>She seemed to believe him, at least. Always the wrong choice. “All right. Look, I think whatever got you before relented while you died, so if you could get back to the shuttle while you have your mind clear, I can run some test on you, and that would be all”</p>
<p>Marius started doing as she said on instinct, not thinking about it, until he realized the golden opportunity he had. What he had told her about how they treated him, what they had done when he told them he wanted to keep Lyf, he still had feelings about it.</p>
<p>And if he had the chance to get all emo about it, and be able to blame some fucked up Space Drug, well, what was he if not an opportunist.</p>
<p>“You know, I think we should talk about the Lyf thing” he told her.</p>
<p>“What? No. Marius, get to the shuffle,” she ordered, dismissing him like always.</p>
<p>He… he could feel himself get a little angry about that. Not as much as before, but. Still there.</p>
<p>Anyway, with Raph refusing to talk about it, he would have to take matters on his hands.</p>
<p>Looking for some clean space, he climbed a crate that was almost blood free, and sat on top of it. “I don’t want to. I am just going to stay here until you explain your actions to me, and <em>fucking apologize</em>” he crossed his legs, getting comfortable.</p>
<p>If he knew her at all, he would be there for some time.</p>
<p>“Marius” she said through her teeth.</p>
<p>He paid no attention to her tone. “I just want to warn you, I filled all of my pockets with crackers, so I can wait whatever it takes.”</p>
<p>Leaving the comm to his side, he took a packet of crackers, and opened it very loudly next to the microphone. He even crumpled the plastic after, just to irritate her even more.</p>
<p>If the situation got serious, Marius would chew a full packet of the thing, mouth open against the microphone. She didn’t stand a chance.</p>
<p>To her credit, she stood two horrible hours of disgusting noises before she gave in. “Fine!” she screamed. “But it wasn’t just me! Ivy was involved, too”</p>
<p>He grinned, very smug with his victory over the science officer. “Ivy made the numbers and decided that supporting you was her best option.” He told her. Then, in a lower, more serious voice, “Why did you make me leave them?”</p>
<p>The question had been bothering him since they left New Midgard. They had both known about his crush on the inspector, teasing him in an annoying but at the end of the day welcomed way. They had even helped him to get them trapped into their cell with them, and had not been as bad as they could have (they hadn’t killed them, for one!).</p>
<p>So, when he told them he wanted to take them, and they had both just, killed him to get him out of the planet, well. He had been pissed. And hurt. He still was hurt.</p>
<p>He missed Lyf. They knew that, of course, and he knew that they knew because they tried to cheer him up. Raph and Ivy helped him made some robots, and even fought with them until complete destruction with him. And he thinks he has already forgiven them, but that doesn’t change the fact that they had just stepped over him, and he had no fucking clue as to why.</p>
<p>It seemed like he was about to find out, lucky him.</p>
<p>After a prolonged silence, she spoke. “I don’t think we should have relationship with mortals” she says, in a low voice.</p>
<p>That was fucking it?!</p>
<p>“That’s all?” he ask, after she doesn’t say anything else. “Because if it is, it’s fucking hypocritical from your part. After what you had with Frankenstein-“</p>
<p>Marius seemed to have touched a nerve. “It’s not the same at all!”</p>
<p>“Well, then explain me why!” he almost fell off the crate for the scream.</p>
<p>For a whole minute, the only thing that comes through the comm is her heavy breathing. It didn’t matter, Marius was willing to wait.</p>
<p>She finally calmed down, and spoke again. “That was an experiment,” she said. “For Science”</p>
<p>How was it possible, Marius wondered, that she could keep giving him more answers, every one different, and each managed to make him even angrier than he was before? A fucking gift, it was. “I would also have liked to experiment, if that’s what they call it this days’”</p>
<p>Raphaella didn’t laugh at his joke. Good, he didn’t want her to. “It’s not- tell me, Marius von Raum, and be honest for one, do you really believe we are capable of loving? Really? Just, look at us! We have no respect for life, ours or others,” she got started. “The only reason we have any form of relationship between us is because we are physically incapable of killing one another, not that that has stopped us.</p>
<p>And- Look at you! I just sent you to a hell ship to maybe get some clue about what happened without a second thought, and we have a closer relationship between us than any other. And I know you would have done the same. How do you think you and Lyf would have gone?” She inhaled, finishing.</p>
<p>Was that what she really thought? Marius was… shocked, to say the least. It seemed unbelievable, where had all of that come from?</p>
<p>“You have a point, but…” he left the sentence on the air.</p>
<p>He could have tried, is what he didn’t say. He would have been more careful, abandoned his more lethal habits. It’s not like he couldn’t spent some decades, maybe a century without killing everything around him. And if the rest of the crew wouldn’t have been willing to do the same, then they could have found some quiet planet to stay in.</p>
<p>But Marius hadn’t forgotten he was under some sort of truth drug, and the reason he hadn’t spit out all of that was because it was a lie, and he knew it. Old habits die hard, and he had had his for longer than some civilizations existed.</p>
<p>When had it been the last time he had cared about something? Not some passing crush, or a cool hobby, but real love and dedication.</p>
<p>He couldn’t really remember.</p>
<p>There was a sight from the other side.</p>
<p>“Just go to the fucking shuttle, Marius” she ordered him, and this time he complied.</p>
<p>Were they really that fucked up? They weren’t the friendliest of the bunch, but they did care for one another. Right? They were like a family, a much traumatized, murderous family, but a family nonetheless. Lyf could have been part of that, at least for him.</p>
<p>He tried to imagine for a moment that Raph, Ivy Brian and the rest were capable of dying. How their days would go. They would stay on the Aurora, he hoped. Well, Nastya at least. And Jonny, he couldn’t picture him away from his sister. But the rest…</p>
<p>Even if they stayed together, how long would they last? More disagreements that he could count were resolved by murder and a little bit of torture.</p>
<p>He shook his head, getting another cracker and deciding to forget about all that peculiar branch of tough. Instead he grabbed his comm. “I’m still expecting an apology, you know. Greater good or not, that was fucking rude.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>As I said in the tags, I completely disagree with the last part. Marius deserves an eldritch partner, is very capable of loving, fics where they get together give me life, and I stared at the screen for a long while in anger. But! I wanted to explore on the concept, and then it was written, and so I unleash the monstruosity.</p>
<p>On a side note, I still have no idea how to tittle stuff (and it shows)</p></blockquote></div></div>
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